


Avenging Angel

by SouthernMoonshine



Category: Havemercy Series - Jaida Jones & Danielle Bennett
Genre: Asexual Relationship, BDSM, Bloodplay, D/s, Established Relationship, M/M, Strawberries, cameo of balfour and adamo, play piercing, porn i guess, they've been doing this a while
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-06
Updated: 2015-02-06
Packaged: 2018-03-10 17:51:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3298751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SouthernMoonshine/pseuds/SouthernMoonshine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lulls between action of the front made them all so testy, upset, pent-up and full of themselves. Carousing out on the town helped for some. For others, it did not, and they had their own recourses to blowing off steam.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Avenging Angel

Lulls between action of the front made them all so testy, upset, pent-up and full of themselves. Carousing out on the town helped for some. For others, it did not, and they had their own recourses to blowing off steam. Raphael watched as Ace and Rook got into it, snapping sharp barbs at eachother until it seemed likely to come to blows. Ghislain, eternal peacemaker, did so this time by throwing a pawn at Rook's head, so the hyper-sensitive man dodged the tiny harmless missile violently and went storming over to berate him instead. Evariste's lip curled as he got up from the game to hunt down the missing pawn, and Ivory's piano-playing was a dissonant sulking melody that made Raphael want to throw his book at him.

It was raining out, but that would not stop the vast majority of the men tonight from going out whoring. Or drinking.

Raphael had other plans, tonight, but he wasn't certain of them.

Not until he crossed paths with Ace in the hall. "A little tense, aren't you?"

"You're not much better, poet," Ace returned, the lazy corner of his lip taking on the curl of a snarl.

"Perhaps you'd join me in a little poetry reading tonight? Verse is good for the soul," Raphael said, but smiled sharp and mocking. Hopeful.

Ace sniffed. "I might. If only to see what drivel you're touting as good this time."

"I promise, I've found something even you might enjoy." Oh it was so hard to keep the satisfaction, the anticipation off his face. Because they were not speaking of poetry at all, and after almost everyone left tonight, they would have quite a few hours of the Airman being still and quiet. Perfect for a little session of stress-relief.

Raphael went on his way and waited impatiently for nightfall. As he heard Rook declaring he was going out drinking, and the loud commotion that followed, he laid down the book he'd been trying - and failing - to read for the past two hours. Standing, he moved to his heavy cedar clothes-chest and opened it to dig down through his clothes. His fingers searched through fabric, brushed over leather, hard cane, cold metal. Over to the right, and he pulled out the box he'd placed there especially for this occasion. He'd gotten the idea a few weeks ago, but only now was he going to get the chance to try it out.

Anticipation made his heart run pleasantly faster, heat coiling low at the base of his spine. 

A delightful evening, he hoped.

Slowly, the racous voices in the halls dwindled, and Raphael left his room, carrying the box.

Ace was already in the empty, dim common room, with a decanter of wine and two glasses, seated in front of the fire on the floor with several cushions liberated from the couch. There was a plate of cheese and bread, and a small astonishing pile of strawberries. Raphael beamed, taking in the sight: Ace's long-fingered hand cradling the wineglasses's stem, the dark stain of good wine already on his narrow lips, his shockingly blue eyes heavy-lidded and dispassionate. The firelight gleamed russet in his riot of red red curls, his lithe angular body clad only in his shirtsleeves and breeches and thick woollen socks.

Raphael wore much the same, because who cared if they went around the Airmen without waistcoats or the like? Nobody, and Raphael sank down to sit beside Ace on the hearth, setting the box aside for now. He took up the second glass of the dark red wine, the one waiting full for him, and took a long sip. It was excellent, rich and full-bodied.

"Did you bring any water? We'll want that, for you and for cleaning up."

Ace raised a lazy brow. "Planning on getting messy?"

"Not a big mess, but yes." Raphael beamed at him, and sipped the wine again. "Where did you find strawberries, of all things?" He reached for one of the plump round fruits, and popped it into his mouth with a delighted hum. Sharp sweetness washed over his tongue, a burst of coolness.

"I didn't. Niall did, but he owed me." Ace smirked, and sipped the wine. He was watching Raphael's lips now.

"How wicked of you, my dear. I don't suppose I could ask for you to fetch us an ewer and basin for water, can I?" Raphael knew the answer already, and smiled.

"Certainly not. Fetch it yourself, lazybones," Ace drawled, but he met Raphael's gaze for a moment...and then dropped it, face turning down minutely.

"Just this once, my pet," Raphael purred, around the sweet taste of the strawberries, and smiled when Ace shivered. He set the wine down, the glass singing against the flagstones, and went to get a pitcher of water and a wide-mouthed bowl from the kitchen. He ran across Adamo, making coffee, who only raised an eyebrow and pointedly did not ask what on earth Raphael was doing.

Just as well, the answer likely would have shocked him.

Raphael smiled to himself as he slipped back into the commons, and found Ace almost just as he had left him: only munching on a slice of bread laden with cheese. Raphael chuckled, coming to sit down again, pouring water into the basin then pushing it near to the fire to warm. He set the pitcher by the wine decanter, and snagged his own piece of bread. "The way you eat is sinful. Such decadence, such grace. Saints look down and weep." The arch of Ace's wrist, the curl of his fingers, the way he licked his lips after every bite.

"Only to the sinner," Ace returned, blandly, and ate the last bite. He reached for a strawberry, and Raphael's toes curled as he watched him bite into the rich plump fruit, teeth so white as the juice dripped down his chin and his tongue chased after it.

Sinner indeed, as lust danced on his nerve endings. "I intend to mark you up very well this evening, my pet. I hope you have comfortable shirts for the next few days."

Ace's eyebrows rose, and he glanced at the box. "A bit small for your usual toys."

"Indeed. Want to have a look?"

Ace merely smiled and shook his head, and Raphael shivered now. Oh, such a dangerous, powerful thing, this trust between them. Such a terrifying, beautiful, fragile thing Ace handed him in that answer. _I trust you._ Trusted him to keep to their boundaries, to not hurt him more than he asked to be hurt. Trust like that could conquer a man, and Raphael was indeed hopelessly conquered.

"Safeword, then?" They always used the same ones.

"Thoushalt." It was like a ritual, and already Ace's blue gaze was starting to unfocus. Anticipation.

"Then shirt off and kneel, my pet," Raphael ordered, feeling the sharp smile lift his lips, bare his teeth.

Ace set the wine in his hand down and reached for the buttons of his shirt.

Raphael began to move the wine and food out of the way. He opened the box, and took out the first bundle, spreading it: a roll of cloth, protecting a handful of rich golden-copper feathers: pheasant wing feathers, gleaming soft and speckled with black. He spread this along the stones, listening to the snap and chuckle of the fire, the rustle of cloth as Ace shed his shirt.

He looked up to Ace's bare chest. His skin was creamy pale, and the blue veins showed clearly withere the skin was thin. Unlike the eerie transluscence of Ivory, Ace's paleness was warm and rich, pulsing with the blood that flowed in him, the life that beat in the hollow of his throat, the curve of his narrow wrists. Unlike Merritt, Ace had no freckles, skin unblemished save for the dark bold tattoo on his left bicep: the twisting shape of a dragon, black as soot and ash, worked tiny and detailed there. 

"Feathers?" Ace queried, but his voice had gone soft. Already he was dropping down to just that place.

"Tonight, my pet, I'm going to give you wings," Raphael promised, reverently.

He had Ace kneel with his back to him, hands spread across his thighs. Ace hissed for the chill as Raphael dipped a handkerchief corner into the wine and washed his back with it, spanning from his shoulderblades in. Only then did he uncover what else lay in the box, sheltered in layers of insulating flannel: needles. Dozens of them, longer than any sewing needle, all so sharp and glittering in the firelght.

Raphael took up the first, and rolled it between thumb and forefinger. He placed his other hand on Ace's back: flawless, unmarked skin, blushed by the wine, and his fingertips tingled. "Ready?" he breathed, and held the needle poised.

"Yes..." The answer was whisper soft, Ace's flesh broken out in chill-bumps, muscles tensing to brace beneath Raphael's steadying hand.

The soft hissed curse Ace let out as the needle pierced his flesh ran straight down Raphael's spine to his groin, hot and liquid. Blood beaded but did not run, and Raphael checked the angle before reaching for another needle. Ace was still, so still, which made it so easy to thread the long needles in just under the skin, and Ace's breath hissed with each one. His hands flexed on his thighs, his back ramrod straight. Another, and again, half a dozen long silver needles pierced through flesh.

One side finished. Raphael picked up the first feather, and narrow reel of red ribbon. He began to bind the feather to the needle, twist the ribbon through the needles to make a pattern. As he worked with the needles, Ace's little hisses turned slowly to groans. The tugs on the metal imbedded in his skin beaded up droplets of blood that ran down, ruby red against the angry red of the abused flesh.

Ace bruised _so_ beautifully, in such bright and vivid blues and purples. Raphael loved it, the delicate latticework of blood beneath sheltering skin, the miracle that was healing in seven shades of green and yellow...but most of all he loved them dark and fresh and stark under Ace's skin, and knowing that his was the hand that left them there.

Feather after feather, and at last Raphael tied off the ribbon and picked up a needle.

Ace groaned, and trembled as he was pierced, head rolling back, curls spilled down his back in ringlets of fire and garnet. Raphael leaned foward and kissed the soft skin just below those curls, just below the nape of his neck, lips dry. Oh, he smelled of dragonsteel and smoke, of cinnamon and musk, of iron and blood and pleasure, sweat starting on his skin. Raphael leaned back, smiling wide with eager hunger, and picked up another needle. Each touch was hot under his fingertips, lightning down his spine, lust and desire pooled hot in his loins, his cock growing tight in his pants.

Another, and another, and Ace's breathing was picking up, closer now to his own peak, a different sort of pleasure than Raphael enjoyed. Ace was not here for the physical, but the emotional, for sex was not a thing he enjoyed, but only endured. Raphael respected that, and it would be his own hands that finished himself off, but later. Now...now was the resistance of willingly-offered flesh, the blood tacking his fingertips, the scent of Ace's sweat. He bent again, kissed that same spot on Ace's back, and touched his tongue to salt-dusted flesh.

Oh, oh he was so beautiful, the coppery gold of the feathers contrasted so soft against his skin, almost a match for his hair in the blushing firelight, the blood tickling down his back in narrow beads that traced every line and ridge of well-developed muscle from flying. Ace was whipcord and muscle over bone, lean and sharp and strung taut under Raphael's hands, straining for that release. 

A flicker at the doorway caught Raphael's attention as he held a needle poised. He glanced up, and found Balfour stading at the cracked door, face blank with shock, a gloved hand held over his mouth.

Of all people to find them, Raphael thought Balfour was the least likely to run tell tales. Those who had stayed behind were those who generally enjoyed their own company...or had their own secrets to keep. Balfour was among the former, and the youngest, and the newest, and harmless. So Raphael said nothing, merely turned back to Ace. He threaded the needle home, and Ace trembled and breathed a soft moan. 

One more, and Ace shuddered on a long inhale, his hands suddenly going lax on his thighs, his breath sighing out soft and low. Beneath Raphael's hand he no longer trembled, all the tension run out of him, sitting straight and soft and still. Raphael smiled, and reached for a feather.

Now each tug at the needles as Raphael worked ribbon and feathers along the shining silver pinions brought forth from Ace long whispering sighs and low breathy moans. Raphael didn't have to look to know the readhead's face would be a mask of ecstacy, electric blue eyes gone dark with pupils blown, narrow lips parted and slack, cheeks flushed, brows woven into that particular knot that spoke only of pleasure. With his wild riot of curls Raphael daydreamed the expression would be similiar to the one he might wear after a good hard night's fucking, but that would be one reality he'd never discover. Instead, he rolled his hips restlessly to the sounds Ace let fall from his lips, and the moment he had a hand free he was going to pay himself some wanted attention.

As he tied the final knot, a little flicker of motion again caught his eye, and his fingers jumped as he looked up, jarring the needle badly. He met Balfour's eyes and then Adamo's behind him as in response to the jarred needle, Ace let out a sound that could only be described as obscene, one that raked hot claws of need and hunger down Raphael's spine and dug low into his belly. Balfour was blushing scarlet, and Adamo clamped a hand over his shoulder and yanked him from sight, face a peculiar mixture of anger and worry.

Let him worry. If he said anything later, Raphael would handle it.

He sat back and admired his handiwork: the gleam of needles, the gloss of ribbon, the beautiful curve of the satiny feathers, the blood, the rising bruises, the natural pleasing arch of Ace's spine and shoulderblades bared.

Raphael groaned softly, and unfastened his pants. Even as he slipped his hand inside, fingers fumbling out the familiar feel of his own flesh, he reached out and smoothed a feather, traced a single finger down the needle to where it lay buried under flesh. Ace all but whimpered, head rolling, and Raphael shuddered to the sound, hips rocking, hand curled tight around his own cock. He was so hard, so close, and Ace made such a pretty picture....

"Oh, my pet, so beautiful. So good, so lovely," he breathed, and ran his finger down along the raised ridges of flesh where the needles nestled under skin. Blood welled up and beaded, and Ace sighed with pleasure, not pain, and Raphael's furiously-working hand tightened before his hips bucked and bliss washed through him, sharp and staggering. Ace trembled under the soft, choked noises Raphael made, a cry silenced down to something only they could hear, because Raphael had the tendency to scream.

Raphael's free hand braced between Ace's shoulderblades, the tingle and glitter along his nerves of the orgasm's afterglow. Raphael licked his lips and straightened slowly, his hands trembling. Oh, he felt so good. 

"Pretty as a picture. Pity I didn't have the foresight to bring a mirror." Raphael was no hand at sketching: that was Compagnon and Merritt and Ivory who did washed-pale watercolour landscapes. 

He wished Ace could see it, though, the magic that was the barest sketch of wings. Wings for a man who flew like he was part of his dragon, leaned close along her neck in copper and silver and violent brilliant scarlet, his narrow foxy face wild with triumph and a hunter's hunger. Oh, he was beautiful in all the ways there were to be beautiful, Raphael thought, and let his fingers trail along the soft knobs of Ace's spine, all in a row like pearls on a string.

He reached for his handkerchief to start cleaning himself up, and eyed the needles remaining in the box. It hadn't taken long for Ace to go under: he must have been yearning for it as much as Raphael had, needed it just as badly. Raphael felt quiet now, light, as though he could take flight without wings, the low hum of pleasure still in his body. He bent, and brushed aside the sheltering curls, and kissed Ace on the nape of his neck. As he sat back, he briefly envisioned what that long slender neck would look like embraced by leather.

If they survived the war, Raphael dreamed, he would ask to collar Ace. No more of these stolen nights, no more of this stifling secrecy. 

He didn't know if it was pitiful or audacous of him to have the collar in the bottom of his clothes-chest, a beautiful thing of rolled dark leather, narrow like Ace, metal links polished to brightness and the small delicate lock and keys waiting beside. He'd brought it months ago, just because the narrow lines of it, the slim spare beauty, reminded him of Ace.

Raphael sighed, and shuddered, and tugged the knotting of the ribbons loose.He unwound it to the chorus of whispered sighs and breathless moans, and laid it and the feathers aside.

Now, _now_ the blood ran freely as Raphael pulled the needles from flesh, one by one, so careful to come out at exactly the angle he had gone in. The noises Ace made had gone to low throbbing cries, fingers curling on his thighs, as the blood wept down his back and Raphael bent to kiss the wounds, pass his tongue through the blood, taste the heavy iron weight of it thick in his mouth as Ace's skin shivered beneath each kiss.

One by one, the bloodied needles rinsed in water and laid along the flannel to dry, and Raphael found his second handkerchief and began to wash Ace's back clean. The half-dried rivulets of blood were sticky and tenacious, and Raphael had to scrub, but gently, gently. He realized he hadn't thought to bring his medicinal salve, and grimaced. He'd have to fetch it, because it helped with the bruising and healing, and Ace's back was going to be five shades of purple. Already the redness radiating around the needle punctures was fading to blue.

He washed until there was no more blood, only scabbing pinpricks and red marks. Then he shuffled forward, and tugged lightly at Ace's narrow shoulders. Ace leaned back with a sigh, his body a supple curve as he swayed up against Raphael, head falling to nest so naturally in the hollow of Raphael's shoulder. Raphael tipped his head and smiled down at him, at the soft hazy look Ace still wore.

"Good?" he asked, testing to see exactly how far under Ace still was.

The response was slow to come, the words slurred softly, like a dreamer speaking from sleep. "Good. Hurt...more than I expected."

Raphael raised an eyebrow. "More than a whipping?"

A slow nod, and Ace's vivid blue eyes drifted closed, lashes patterned dark against his skin. His breathing was slow, deep even. "Felt good."

Raphael smiled, and kissed him on the temple, luxuriating in the warmth of him, the weight of him, and cradled him close. Oh so precious, so perfect, and Ace rested quietly in his arms. Raphael waited, because he would wake, and this moment would end, and they would go on with their lives. But until then, he was content with counting every breath, feeling the flex of Ace's body against his, knowing that he and only he got to see this vulnerability, this trust.

Raphael freed a hand at last to pour a glass of water. A thin cloud of wine whirled up from the bottom of the glass, dark threaded. The fire was dying down, the red glow rich and turning Ace's skin the same shade as his hair. Raphael nudged him, and when blue eyes slitted open, pressed the glass to his lips. Ace drank, and Raphael watched, captured anew by the motion of his throat, the curl of his lips, the way his lashes dipped closed again. Raphael finished off the water, and set the empty glass down. It shimed a soft clear note, and Raphael scooped up a strawberry next. This time, Ace smiled at him, sharp and foxy, before he took a bite. 

Raphael fed him that one, and then took one for himself. He bit it in half, and the juice ran down his chin. He started to wipe it on his sleeve: Ace leaned up and kissed it off, and Raphael shuddered, his heart catching hard in his chest. Oh, he was so in love with this beautiful perfect man, so utterly conquered. He finished the berry and fed another to Ace. The lassitude in Ace's limbs was dissipating, and the dreamy haze was fading out of his sleepy expression. Never did it last long enough for Raphael's taste: he dreamed of the day he and Ace could spend so much more time than these flash-fire liasons. He wanted to spend the day learning every reaction anew, every line of that lithe body, every breath and sigh, see him filled up and broken open with pleasure, reduce him to a beautiful wreck in bed. 

But that was a distant dream, one that was so often overshadowed by the grim reality of their lives, of the war.

Raphael's fingers curled around Ace's wrist, as Ace sighed and took the wineglass from him. He took a few sips, then set it down.

Ace sat up slowly, testing, and rolled his shoulders slowly. A few drops of blood appeared, and Raphael caught up the damp handkerchief and leaned forward to wipe them away. Ace's toes curled, and he smiled in a little blissful tremor. Raphael loved seeing that, the way pleasure ran soft over his face: it made his chest warm and his own lips turn up in a smile. He bent, and kissed the sleek curve of Ace's shoulder, shadowed starkly in the dim. Ace turned his head, the outline of his smile traced in the firelight, and Raphael kissed him on the lips, soft and chaste. He leaned back and Ace was chuckling, but gently.

"Sentimental," he chided, but lovingly.

"Always for you, my pet." Laying aside the wet handkerchief, Raphael plucked up Ace's shirt and helped him into it, slowly. "I forgot my salve."

"We can take the berries and the wine back to your room," Ace decided, leaving his shirt unbuttoned and shifting his shoulders again.

Unexpected, the offer for further communion even after, and Raphael would take all that he could get. Greedy of him, yes, but who was there to see or catcall tonight? Raphael rolled up both feathers and needles, and stowed them in his box again. "That is an excellent idea. Let me put the pitcher and basin back, then I'll help you carry things." He got to his feet to do just that, though all he really wanted to do now was stay on the floor. His knees were still a bit watery. He poured Ace a second glass of water, and left him with that as he headed for the kitchen again. Despite the comment of taking the wine, neither of them was likely to drink any more this evening. It was, Raphael mused, a little farce they still couldn't drop despite being in relative privacy. What habits a life of secrecy forced.

The water in the basin was pink, as Raphael poured it down the sink. He emptied the pitcher, too, and headed back up the silent hallway to rejoin Ace: still sitting in front of the fire, wineglass of water cradled in both long-fingered hands as he nursed it. His heavy-lidded gaze was again dispassionate, cool, but then he smiled for Raphael and he was so beautiful, slender and serene and tough as dragonsteel too. Raphael went to him, and reached down to cup his face in his hands. Ace pressed his cheek against Raphael's wrist. "Oh, you undo me so, you glorious avenging angel."

Ace snorted out a chuckle, leaning back with a grin. "What in fuck, Raphael, what am I avenging?" He set one hand on the floor and got up slowly, as Raphael turned and bent to gather up the wine, the other glass, the plate of strawberries and breadcrumbs. 

"Volstov, of course, our widespread motherland," Raphael told him, straightening. "You even fly."

Ace burst out with his low rolling laugh again. "Daft."

"Oh, so I am. All poets are, you know." Raphael beamed and led the way out. Ace followed, wineglass of water still held in both hands.


End file.
